Please allow us to downgrade ARC firmware

[Sparkle-B580]

I was using older drivers for my B580 from March - April no problems on some older non DX12 games and they worked fine. For example in one of my old favorites APB Reloaded I had stutters, however after editing ingame .ini to disable texture streaming and garbage collection used by the engine I was able to get a nice smooth stutter free experience with high framerates, the only issue I had was some weird shadowy artifact on the left side of the screen but performance wise I was pretty happy. 

Now come end of May and I have updated the drivers and they broke the game for me. The editing of ingame config files did not solve the performance problem only helped a bit, I was stuttering even on empty servers with barely anyone online which was unheard of even on old PCs. I tried downgrading the drivers, clearing the DX shader cache, tried system restore - everything I could think of and nothing helped. Then I found out that Intel drivers also upgrade firmware of the GPU and that there is no way to downgrade it.

So now I'm stuck with the unplayable stuttering with no way to get back old performance wishing I had waited and bought something like 9060 XT. Please allow us to downgrade the firmware in cases like these where it breaks something. Thanks

[UnaSalusVictis]

techpowerup forums has a guide to flash firmware on arc cards as well as a database of all arc firmware/etc.

test DXVK, and the current drivers seem to be more of an issue than the firmware itself, the changes they made not so long ago are giving some people seriously weird issues. 

test just installing an older driver  if that dosnt work, try DDU and reinstall the older driver(or newer), like AMD and to a lesser degree nvidia.. "if in doubt ddu".. 

its annoying but i have found that for all 3 vendors sometimes this or dgvoodoo2 are the best fix for random issues with random old games.. including them just not wanting to load..  

[RandyT_Intel]

Hi @Sparkle-B580,

There is firmware available for Intel Arc GPUs however Intel takes a different approach to firmware updates, and these updates are often bundled with driver releases. You can find a compilation of driver releases here: Intel® Arc™ & Iris® Xe Graphics - Windows*

To further investigate the performance issue on your system, please provide the following information below.

• Please provide the SSU log report and share it here so I can review your system's configuration. 
• Could you let me know which digital distribution platform you use to get the game? (epic, steam, battle net, etc)
• Have you previously performed a clean installation of the graphics driver, before using either an older or the latest version? 
• Kindly share some screenshots and recordings of your game settings so we can replicate and check the issue on our end using the same settings you use during gameplay. 
• Screenshot of the issue concerning artifacts.
• Can you remember the driver version that works for the game?
• Additionally, you may follow this guide on how to report performance issues in the game. 

For initial troubleshooting you may try the steps outlined to this article-How to Downgrade the Drivers for the Intel® Arc™ Graphics? before doing so please perform a DDU as suggested by @UnaSalusVictis  , you may follow this-How to Use the Display Driver Uninstaller (DDU) to Uninstall an...

Looking forward to your response.

Regards,  

Randy T.  

Intel Customer Support Technician  

[RandyT_Intel]

Hi @Sparkle-B580,

Just checking in on my previous message regarding your inquiry. Have you had a chance to review it? If you need more information or have any questions, feel free to reach out. I'm here to help!

Regards,  

Randy T.  

Intel Customer Support Technician  

[RandyT_Intel]

Hi @Sparkle-B580,

Since I haven't heard from you, I will proceed with closing this case. Please note that it will no longer be monitored. However, you may submit a new ticket if you need further assistance in the future.

Regards,  

Randy T.  

Intel Customer Support Technician